Twitter and the CBC: Antisemitism gets a free ride on both

(J-Practical, October 21, 2012)

On October 19th, CBC.ca posted a story about how Twitter responded to a tsunami of racist and antisemitic tweets (“Twitter removes French-language anti-Semitic tweets” – www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012/10/19/twitter-racist-tweets-france.html).

This very same CBC.ca report inadvertently provides a fascinating study in how ineffective and unresponsive our own national broadcaster can be, when faced with antisemitism posted to their own website.

Unlike Twitter, the CBC website’s user-generated content is not supposed to be a free-for-all.

It’s still our national broadcaster, purportedly governed by Content Submission Guidelines, which prohibit people from posting “Hate Speech” (section 9.c), and monitored by a team of moderators that carry out that policy. As a further measure, each posted comment has a little button called “Report Abuse”, that lets readers alert the moderators if they think an inappropriate comment snuck in unnoticed.

But, like rust, antisemitism doesn’t sleep. Sadly, CBC’s website moderation apparently does, because while the CBC was reporting the antisemitism on Twitter, they were actively ignoring antisemitism on their own website.

The CBC.ca comments section for the Twitter antisemitism story drew the ‘A’ Team like flies to honey. But the CBC moderation team may as well have been absent. Here are some examples of the comments they let through:

Taxpayingidiot (2012/10/19 at 8:46 PM ET) tells us that “Twitter caved in to the most powerful group on the globe” – implying, of course, those crafty, controlling Joos. The same person then follows up with another comment, about how they wield so much power on the “world’s financial markets and the foreign policies of many western countries”

JoanneMengele (2012/10/20 at 2:53 AM ET) compares the victims of antisemitism to the Rolling Stones title “Sympathy for The Devil”, Jew = devil. Who knew? Well, perhaps somebody who chose to post under a name evocative of the infamous Auschwitz doctor.

Howardhicks (2012/10/19 at 3:26 PM ET) wants to know why we shouldn’t consult with the Jews (AIPAC) about all internet communication

Let Us Prey (2012/10/19 at 1:29 PM ET) is offended that the Jews complain about antisemitism, and suggests “they set up a system where we just don’t mention them at all”

nyumbu (2012/10/20 at 11:53 AM ET) seems to think that racism is something that the Jews shouldn’t complain about.

noonespecial (2012/10/20 at 1:33 PM ET) responds to nyumbu’s comment, and tells us that antisemitism “has nothing to do with reality”, and Jews should just accept it “take insult with a grain of salt”, and further suggests that antisemitism is just a product of the Jews’ problems with “self esteem”. He closes his comments with the profundity of “Sticks and stone can break my bones but names will never hurt me” – thereby demonstrating how people who are dirt-ignorant of history are unlikely to learn from history’s most horrible lessons.

Proactive (2012/10/20 at 11:32 AM ET) thinks we live in an “era of selective censorship and protectionism” that Jews buy with their money, and later posts (2012/10/21 at 12:37 PM ET) that he doesn’t “condoln (sic) the actions of any extremest (sic) faction” and questions whether “the playing field is equal”. I don’t know which playing field he means (and probably, neither does he), but I’d sure like him to provide another example of 2,000 year-old violent persecution to ‘level the playing field’.

 

Not only did the CBC moderators miss these comments on the way in, but they also ignored alerts from CBC.ca readers who hit the ‘Report Abuse’ button on these comments.

I myself hit that button 14 times this weekend, and explained each time why each of the comments above were antisemitic and violated CBC Policy. I doubt if I’m the only one who hit that button.

Nothing happened. Isn’t that strange?

So I emailed the CBC Moderation Team to alert them and request they take action concerning the antisemitic trash posted on CBC.ca

Again, nothing happened. Isn’t that strange? What could the problem be? Is it that:

  1. The moderators are too busy to notice.
  2. The technology is failing the CBC, and the moderators don’t realize the comments are there, or that readers have submitted abuse reports pointing out the comments.
  3. The moderators don’t understand the racist comments, and are letting them through, and then ignoring the abuse reports.
  4. The moderators have chosen to allow this content, because they somehow believe it’s compliant with CBC policy to trash Jews on CBC.ca .

 

I’m patiently waiting for the CBC to do something (well, OK… not so patiently). Some of these comments have been online for 3 days, despite the mechanisms the CBC put in place to prevent such situations. The successive failure of all these mechanisms makes the CBC look like it has the same low-low standards as Twitter.

It’s also not the first time this has happened. Is this the quality that we expect of our national broadcaster. Is it too much to ask that the CBC keep antisemitism off its website?

About Eeyore

Canadian artist and counter-jihad and freedom of speech activist as well as devout Schrödinger's catholic

One Reply to “Twitter and the CBC: Antisemitism gets a free ride on both”

  1. CBC moderation of reader comments is getting worse as every day goes by. Canadians who pay a billion dollars a year for this organization are getting a poor return on their investment, and while our Charter or Rights allows us the privilege of free speech, and one would think the national broadcaster’s stories would be an opportunity for Canadians to engage in a dialogue, the opportunity has been throttled back to a trickle. How do they do this? (1) by imposing a highly censored filter on anything which challenges the ideas being put forward by the main published story itself. If it is any way critical of content of the CBC story, for example by pointing to elements that have a contentious nature, or by challenging the ‘sources’ of their story, chances are you’ll be filtered out. (2) by slowing the publishing of comments to a point that it takes hours (4,5,6) for comments to even appear. By doing this they deliberately discourage interest and the following of the conversation among Canadians that follows the story. (3) by squeezing the window of opportunity to comment down from days to what appears to be only hours now .. readers have little opportunity to get involved with the ‘small’ window of time that is available to participate. It has perhaps gotten worse since some of the implementation of Harper’s C-51 began to kick in, and so any challenging of the official story (which has been proven so many times to be absolutely false, misleading disinformation and propaganda), any contest to the narrative which is presented by the story, is quickly removed. Mark Twain once said that “If you don’t read the news paper, you’re uninformed. If you do read the newspaper, you’re misinformed.” The appearance of alternative sources of news has been a major challenge to the MSM, but they have been the cause of their own demise through the telling of their false narratives. Many readers responding on this issue have said that the ‘reader comments’ were the best part of CBC stories, because it was in there that one could read the pulse of the Canadian people. It’s true; the comments have often been the best part of the story, with frequently better crafted, more insightful, intelligent writing. It’s criminal that Canadians are moderated by a company in another part of the world, too (I.C.U.C.) .. this company is utterly failing in it’s responsibility to Canadians ‘and’ the CBC .. their moderation is driving readers away. CBC fails Canadians once again by imposing this draconian control over the publishing of reader comments, and this militant censoring of reader feedback. It’s offensive, and a lot of people are abandoning the broadcaster for this reason alone. I certainly am. Canadians would be far better served if the billion dollars a year that goes into this white elephant were spent on something more worthwhile. Shut CBC down; they are not worth it any more.